


Cassiopeia

by CaptainNightGale



Series: The songs our lives sing [1]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Based on a song, Gen, LadyNoir - Freeform, but listen; the night makes us strange creatures, it's a type of mask in itself, tbh they probably got away from me, what is consistant characterisation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-06
Updated: 2017-06-06
Packaged: 2018-11-09 19:04:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11110905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainNightGale/pseuds/CaptainNightGale
Summary: it's time to tell a storyLong ago and so many years before weEver were, ever dreamed we even could beThere was her and her very first heartbeat





	Cassiopeia

**Author's Note:**

> Will all my stories for these guys be based on songs?  
> I mean probably
> 
> (Cassiopeia, Sara Bareilles)

The rain has stopped when Ladybug throws herself up and over the balcony into the city, alight with a nervous energy that has been plaguing her since the end of the school day.  
Since the umbrella –  
Ladybug laughs, slips on slick tiles, and somehow manages to turn it into a graceful spin, delighting in the balance that comes with luck and strength and spots.  
The city looks different at night, looks different from the rooftops, and she’s going to have to learn her home anew, find the best and the quickest ways to get about.  
There’s a joyous humming that _isn’t_ her but _is_ in her, and she recognises it almost as Tikki, as condensed luck and the opportunity to create great things. The feeling is old – older than the earth, as old as the stars (perhaps older, but there are many things she hasn’t asked Tikki yet) – and yet new, a clear cut _awe_ at the world about and how it has changed and grown on, and become _more_ than they’d ever quite imagined at its birth.  
In some way, it makes her want to sing, but the roofs are slick and she’d rather concentrate on not falling.  
“Ladybug!”  
She turns at the shout, and sees the green of his eyes before he’s impossibly close and they collide, tumbling together into the street below, and he’s laughing as he lands on his feet, Ladybug caught up in his arms.  
“Hello, Chat.” She smiles and pulls free, brushing herself down. “What brings you out?”  
“The night sky. The freedom.” He spins his staff free from its slot on the back of his belt, leaning on it as his tail twitches behind him. “And you.” He laughs, smiling as if at a joke all his own. "What are your reasons?"  
Ladybug hesitates, trying to find a way to describe it. “A feeling. It – stretches back, beyond–” She stops, frowning.  
Chat lifts his right hand, turning it so she can see the green paw print of his ring. “Right?”  
Ladybug lifts her hands to her earrings. Of course he would understand.  
Extending his hand to her, he waits.  
Ladybug takes his hand, feels the slight roughness of his gloves, the bump of his ring over the glove.  
Chat extends his staff and sends them back onto the roofs that will in time become their second home.  
Ladybug wonders if they might not be their first home, as Ladybug and Chat Noir. She spins out her yoyo before they’ve properly landed, hooks a chimney pot and is away.  
Chat lets out a laugh and follows, leaping along underneath and beside, and as they leap over streets they cross paths and launch off one another, learning the ropes and themselves.  
Although they come close, they never crash again as they race the rooftops, and when it starts gently raining, they trade a glance and a laugh and land precariously close to the edge of a building on the Champ de Mars.  
All at once, they are silent and still, and the rain falls soft about them. The feeling hasn’t left, but it’s – changed. Become a quiet ember rather than the fire that had driven her out into the night.  
Ladybug palms her yoyo and gazes out towards the Eiffel tower, glowing in the night. “Do you ever wonder–” she starts, and then hesitates. One hand goes to an earring. They haven’t had them that long, and yet–  
“From the first heartbeat of the universe,” Chat whispers.  
She turns to see him, and he’s watching her, eyes glowing in the darkness.  
“The feeling. It’s like a supernova.”  
“Bigger than us,” she says, turning to face him fully. “So much bigger, Chat, and now we–”  
Chat gives a half smile, an ear flicking rain drops away. “Older,” he replies, “But not bigger.”  
Ladybug frowns, passing the yoyo from hand to hand. “There is more to these – _miraculous_ than us, Chat.”  
“We’re made of the same stuff,” he insists. “We’re made of star dust, too.” He glances at her, and then away and up, into the clouded sky. “Why else can I see the stars in your eyes?” he murmurs, almost as if it’s just meant for himself.  
Ladybug stares at him. And then she laughs, and the sound is a bell and the heartbeat of joy and the creation of light all at once.  
Chat Noir smiles, almost bashfully. The night, he decides, is a strange thing. He’d seen many of them before – long nights spent up, watching anime and playing games, getting lost in someone else’s life – but this one… this one was different.  
This one was a new beginning.  
“I’m glad we collided,” he says, earnest. He’s not sure if he _just_ meant their first meeting, or the stars that created their world, or – or something else.  
Ladybug groans. “I made such a _mess_. How do you think they chose-”  
“Because someone thought we were worthy. We have something to offer that’s more–” _more than sitting looking pretty,_ he thinks fiercely, and is _glad_ that he was given this, because he can have something that's all his own. A friend that's all his own.  
“Yes, but… but me? I make mistakes, I mess things up–” Ladybug clutches at her face, at her ears, as if she’s thinking of pulling her earrings out.  
“Hey.” He reaches out to touch her arm, gently lifting her near one away from her ear. “ _I_ make the catastrophes, alright? Not you.” _Never you,_ he almost says, and realises just in time that that could be coming on a little strong. This night is soft and gentle, and while it rings with truths, they aren’t heavy. They just _are_.  
Ladybug jumps at the touch, and flashes him a smile. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that. In my civilian life–” And she stops, biting her lip.  
“Would it be so bad? To know each other?”  
“Ah, kitty.” She sighs. “Let me be someone new, alright? Just – for a little while. Then, maybe…”  
Chat grins, eager for the chance. “Don’t worry, my Lady, I’ll spot you.”  
Ladybug laughs, and Chat knows that he has fallen again, and always will, because this – this is just like heaven. Maybe not as he’d always imagined it, but – but perhaps this is better. This is real.

Later, when Ladybug lands back in her room and closes the skylight before too much rain falls in, she sits silent on her bed to listen. Still in her suit, the rain sounds… more. Everything is.  
She wonders where Chat Noir is, what his room’s like. His family.  
But not really, because they aren’t supposed to know each other.  
But, maybe some day…

Chat Noir dives in through his window and turns to close it in one swift move, throwing a rug over the damp path on the floor, where the rain had got in. He presses his gloved hands up against the window and stares out. It had been a stroke of luck to see Ladybug flying by, to have more of a chat with her.  
He hopes they wouldn’t only see each other during Akuma attacks. He hopes that one day they will know each other without the masks.

In two separate rooms, two superheroes straighten up, stare out at the rain that washes their city, and they smile. _One day_. It’s a promise. Maybe only to themselves – _courage_ comes first, and freedom to build up who they could be about the mask, _without_ the mask, to become better – but eventually, it’ll be a promise to each other.  
In two separate rooms, two superheroes relax and meet eyes with their reflections. Maybe they pretend that they’re facing each other.  
And their suits dissolve away like star dust about their eager eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still working out how I write them without butchering their characters too much  
> Like I know Chat Noir is generally loud and boisterous and a bit more of a flirt and all that  
> But I think in the first few days after Stone Heart, once the adrenalin's worn off, he's maybe a little quieter? As the realisation of what they _are_ hits, and they sort of have moments like these (because now they're _superheroes_ and how cool is that!!! but oh shit what if we _mess up_ we're the only ones who can deal with these and we're just _kids_!!! who the heck thought this was a good idea what are we _doing_ )  
> And then the akumas start coming more often, so they build upon what they started, what the world knows of them, and that kinda... became their superhero selves.  
> idk man.  
> I have Thoughts  
> hmu @captainnightgale on tumblr too!


End file.
